1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to wireless communications, and, more particularly, to configuration of access nodes and access terminals in wireless communication systems.
2. Description of Related Art
Many people use mobile stations, such as cell phones and personal digital assistants, to communicate with cellular wireless networks, which typically provide communication services such as voice, Short Message Service (SMS) messaging, and packet-data communication. These mobile stations and networks typically communicate with each other over a radio frequency (RF) air interface according to a wireless communication protocol. In particular, mobile stations typically conduct wireless communications with one or more base transceiver stations (BTSs), each of which are arranged to send communications to and receive communications from mobile stations over the RF air interface.
Each BTS (sometimes referred to as a Node-B) is in turn communicatively connected with a network entity known as a base station controller (BSC) (sometimes referred to as a radio network controller (RNC)), which controls one or more BTSs and acts as a conduit between the one or more BTSs and one or more switches or gateways, such as a mobile switching center (MSC) and/or a packet data serving node (PDSN). The one or more switches or gateways may then interface with one or more signaling and/or transport networks. For example, an MSC may interface with the well-known public switched telephone network (PSTN). As another example, a PDSN may interface with one or more core packet data networks and/or the global Internet. As such, mobile stations can typically communicate over the one or more signaling and/or transport networks from anywhere inside the coverage area of one or more BTSs, via the BTS(s), a BSC, and a switch or gateway such as an MSC and/or PDSN.